Lessons from the book field…Week 8!

Every week for the past eight weeks, I’ve had the privilege of meeting hundreds of people in their homes, of talking with them about their families, their pets, their careers, their relationships, their heartaches—in short, the Varsity internship has been an amazing opportunity to listen, to look myriads of people in the eye—men, women and children—and hear about everything that they’re most passionate about in life (even if that happens to be the two pet turtles out on the front porch—they kinda smelled, but they obviously had thrilled one little four-year-old heart to bits). I’ve had the opportunity to see how people live, how their decisions play out in their lives, and how their attitudes affect their destinies. In some ways, it feels like I’ve learned more about people and about communication in the past eight weeks than I had in the 22 years previous to this summer, but I know I have a whole lot more to pick up in the weeks to come.

This past week, though, I met two women who blessed my heart in a special way.

First was Shelley, the middle-aged Catholic lady who met me at the door at 7:45 on a Thursday morning with a bubbly smile and a contagious enthusiastic giggle. Within two seconds of meeting her, I could already tell that she was in love with life, that she’d made a decision to be up-beat and enthusiastic about anything and everything that happened to her each day, regardless of whether she liked it or not. She was invigorating to be around. Just having her smile at you and seeing the twinkle in her sparkly blue eyes made you feel as if life was infinitely better than you’d ever dared to imagine. When I stood up to go, she turned to me quickly and said, “Honey, it’s so hot out there! Can I get you a bottle of water?!”

I told her she really needn’t bother, cuz I had a thermos in my car, but she insisted…and when she came back, she placed an ice cold glass bottle in my hand and handed me something wrapped in tinfoil.

“Dinner,” she winked, “I made it. It’s zucchini bread, but it’s great for the road.”

As I drove out of her very loooong driveway (they’re all the rage here in Tennessee…keeps the dogs from chasing so many cars), I was honestly and sincerely touched.

“Someday,” I whispered to myself, “I wanna be remembered for being that kind of person…”

The second lady was Karen, an equally vivacious little lady. It was early on a Saturday morning when we met…I’d accidentally waked her up with my knock on her back door, but she graciously invited me to sit out on the screened in porch with her. As she talked, and as I listened, I began to realize that she was gracious and bubbly by choice—she’d had awful, terrible things happen to her over and over again throughout her life, but she was one of the most joyful people I’d ever met.

As I drove off that time, a couple of things were beginning to churn around in my head.

What makes these two different? I asked myself, jogging my steering wheel slightly to the right in order to hit a centipede. They haven’t had better lives. They’ve just had better attitudes. They’ve chosen to view things in a positive light, and it’s changed the way they view their circumstances.

Goodness. This was good. Could it possibly be that one of the key differences between those who succeed in life and those who don’t is simply the way they view their circumstances and what they do as a result of the way they view them?!

With all of the families that I meet each week, one of the main differences that I see between those who are going places, doing things, and making stuff happen and those who are simply actively failing at life is their level of emotional maturity. Emotionally mature people know themselves, their tendencies, and their weaknesses, and they don’t hide behind their emotional state instead of taking responsibility for their actions and their words. Their marriages last, because their word means something—it’s not based on an emotion, but on the facts.

Unfortunately, I also meet a lot of folks who haven’t ever learned to rule their emotions. They make good decisions when they’re emotionally high, and they make bad ones when they’re down in the dumps. They might be on their fifth, sixth, or even seventh marriage. They sometimes have five kids by five different guys, or they have a spouse who’s in prison for meth dealing. Ultimately, they’re often living miserable lives that are a direct result of their emotionally immature decision making.

What is it that makes women like Shelley and Karen different? I’d like to think that at least part of it is just that they’ve learned to rule their emotions, instead of letting their emotions rule them. And I’m convinced that each and every person out there is capable of learning the same lesson—but it takes work.

May God give us the guts and the gumption to buckle down and learn to act, speak, and live as emotionally mature individuals—in our relationships, in our work, in our free time...and possibly in our driving habits? I think I probably need to stop chasing squirrels and opossums with my car…